What Do I Want to Accomplish Through This Program?

When I first heard about the family literacy event that we have to hold, I was very excited due to the fact that my mentor told me to “take my teacher hat” off for it. Meaning, do not make it standards-driven. It’s about creativity, something my school is struggling with when teaching writing, because we focus so much on the RACERS strategy. For my specific idea of my literacy event, I want to make it poetry-centered. It will be for the entire fifth grade, since we teach poetry. Usually, students have a hard time with it, because we focus so much on the “structure” of poetry (i.e. stanzas, rhythm, beat, alliteration, blah, blah, blah). Students would enjoy it so much more if we were to focus on the creativity of it, as well as the main purpose of poetry- to express oneself. I hope this event will bring students closer to their families and classmates, as they poetically write about their feelings, struggles, hardships, and even triumphs of this difficult time.